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Yesterday, I wrote about the Sacral Chakra and how it can inform our writing in terms of our own or our characters’ identities in relation to another person. Today, I’m writing about the third chakra, the Personal Power Chakra.

The Personal Power Chakra relates to a physical form of power, just as the first and second chakras have. The first chakra was about the power of the tribe, and the second chakra was about the power between us and other individuals. The third chakra is about our personal power in relation to the outside world, and it bridges the physical experience and the emotional experience. In essence, it’s about the process of individuation and becoming our own selves.

Having a strong Personal Power chakra allows us to be capable of translating our intentions and desires into manifestation. Sometimes, the only way to individuate is to leave others behind.

Below is a brief explanation of the Personal Power Chakra and some ways we might integrate its attributes into our writing.

Third Chakra – Personal Power Chakra

LocationSolar Plexus, between the navel and center breastbone

Primary strengthsSelf-esteem, self-respect, self-discipline, ambition, ability to handle crisis and take action, generosity and strength of character, courage to take risks, free will

Aspects we might consider for our characters or ourselvesLevel of self-esteem and self-respect, fears around rejection and criticism

Try the following meditation and exercise, and let me know what you come up with.Feel free to post it below this post, or email me at: johnnie@johnniemazzocco.com.

MeditationClose your eyes and do a short visualization of the Personal Power Chakra: A yellow, pulsating orb in your solar plexus, between your navel and breastbone. Imagine it expanding and contracting and spreading out to your sides. Sit with this pulsating, optimistic, confident energy for as long as you can, breathing deeply, for 5-10 breaths. Count to ten slowly on both the inhale and the exhale for each one. When you’re ready, let the energy begin to recede and return to its original size. Maintain its presence in your body as you open your eyes and begin the following writing exercise.

Writing ExerciseFiction Writers
Think of the two characters you’ve been working with recently, or create two new ones. One is the protagonist. The other is the antagonist. These two characters are at odds with each other in some way. This can be blatant conflict, or it can be subtle. Think about how willful or passive each character is. What is the protagonist’s goal or intention, and how does the antagonist interfere with it? Get them involved in a dialogue about the conflict. Their conversation can be direct (discussing the issue at hand openly) or indirect (beating around the bush / being somewhat passive or manipulative).

Creative Non-fiction Writers / Memoirists
Pick an action you want to take but have been putting off.
What are your deepest passions/desires? What do you want to accomplish?
Which of the following describes your feelings around your desires?
– Fearful or anxious?
– Confident and self-assured?
– Sarcastic or pessimistic?
– Wise and clear-minded?
– Over-analytical?
– Curious?
– Alert or foggy?
– Good-humored?
How does your tribe or a person figure in to your feelings around achieving your desires?
What are you going to do about it?

Yesterday, I wrote about the Root Chakra and how it can inform our writing in terms of our own or our characters’ identities in relation to the concept of tribe. Today, I’m writing about the second chakra, the Sacral Chakra, which is about partnership power and our power to create.

The Sacral Chakra relates to our ability to go with the flow, so while all the chakras are important, this one is especially important when it comes to creative flow. Creative flow can mean a lot of things. It can mean artistic flow and creating in that way, or it can mean actually creating life. This chakra is about self-expression in a very deep sense, and it also aligns with partnership, sexuality, pleasure, and relationships. So, while the Root Chakra was about our relationship to our tribe and our place in it, the Sacral Chakra is about our relationship with another.

I’ve observed that, oftentimes, creative people have a difficult time finding that balance between honoring their creative impulses and their relationships, and all too often, their writing practice takes a back seat. While the Sacral Chakra is about creating, as mentioned above, it’s also about creating ourselves, and if we’re to successfully create ourselves, it means we means we have to find balance in our relationships so we don’t get lost in them.

Below is a brief explanation of the Sacral Chakra and some ways we might integrate its attributes into our writing.

Second Chakra – Sacral Chakra

LocationLower abdomen, slightly below the navel

Primary strengthsAbility to take risks, to protect oneself and survive financially and physically, to recover from loss, and to recreate oneself

Primary fearsLoss of control at the hands of another (rape, impotence, abandonment, betrayal, addiction, financial) and loss of physical body due to death or illness

Negative manifestationsAnger, jealousy, killing of creativity due to fear

LessonAccepting that we cannot be in control

Aspects we might consider for our characters or ourselvesAbility to protect oneself, creativity and self-expression, fears around loss of control, anger and jealousy

As with yesterday, below you’ll find a meditation specific to the Sacral Chakra, and some prompts to help you think about how to use the Sacral Chakra to deepen your writing and your understanding of yourself.

Try the following meditation and exercise, and let me know what you come up with.Feel free to post it below this post, or email me at: johnnie@johnniemazzocco.com.

MeditationClose your eyes and do a short visualization of the Sacral Chakra: An orange, pulsating orb in your abdomen, just below your navel. Imagine it expanding and contracting and spreading out to each hip. Sit with this pulsating, enthusiastic and creative energy for as long as you can, breathing deeply, for 5-10 breaths. Count to ten slowly on both the inhale and the exhale for each one. When you’re ready, let the energy begin to recede and return to its original size. Maintain its presence in your body as you open your eyes and begin the following writing exercise.

Writing ExerciseFiction Writers
Think of a character you’ve created, maybe one you’ve been working with recently. It can be a new one, or it can be the one you used yesterday. Imagine a relationship for your character with one other person. This can be any sort of relationship (intimate, familial, platonic, work-related). The characters can be any gender or age. Feel free to build on the exercise from yesterday, if you like. Is this other person a family member your character is on her way to visit and you’ll just continue on with the story you set up yesterday, or is this other person a stranger on the train? What is the overarching tone of the relationship? How do these two characters relate to each other? Do they speak, or is their entire interaction internal for them both, or for only your initial character? What do they think about or say to each other? What happens between them?

Creative Non-fiction Writers / Memoirists
Pick a relationship from your life. This can be any sort of relationship (intimate, familial, platonic, work-related).
What’s the overarching tone of this relationship?
How do creativity, sexuality, and/or abundance (or lack of) figure in to this relationship? Are you generally on the same energetic plane with each other? If so, how? If not, does the energy of one of you overshadow the other and drive the relationship somehow?

Yesterday, I wrote about how, if we follow the flow of ideas that come from Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi’s theories on achieving flow and Candace Pert’s findings about how our emotions originate in the exact locations of the seven main chakras and that our bodies are our subconscious minds, we can utilize the chakras to banish writer’s block, achieve flow, and tell our untold stories.

For example, the First Chakra rules our Tribal Power and Tribal Consciousness, which is about our identity in relationship to our Tribe, which could relate to our family of origin or to some other group or community that’s present in our lives. Deep down, the Root Chakra has to do with identity and a feeling of security and connection to others and to the world.

In our writing, by considering our characters’ place within his or her tribe, or by considering our own, we can begin to uncover important information about human behaviors and motivations.

Below is a brief explanation of the Root Chakra and some ways we might integrate its attributes into our writing.

First Chakra – Root Chakra
LocationDeep in the pelvis, between the tip of the tailbone and the genitals

Primary strengthsTribal/family identity, bonding, support and loyalty that create a feeling of security and connection to the world

Negative manifestations and qualitiesVanity, self-importance, inability to make decisions

LessonAccepting that we cannot be in control

Aspects we might consider for our characters or ourselvesQuality of family ties, sense of security and abundance, fears around abandonment and survival

When we take the time to sit quietly, think about the aspects of the Root Chakra, and do a meditation to clear it, imagining its corresponding color in the form of a pulsating orb, we can open ourselves up to not just a deeper examination and understanding of our characters, but ourselves, as well.

Try the following meditation and exercise, and let me know what you come up with.
Feel free to post it below this post, or email me at: johnnie@johnniemazzocco.com.

MeditationClose your eyes and do a short visualization of the Root Chakra: A red, pulsating orb just in front of your tailbone. Imagine it expanding and contracting and spreading out to each hip. Sit with this pulsating, strong and powerful energy for as long as you can, breathing deeply, for 5-10 breaths. Count to ten slowly on both the inhale and the exhale for each one. When you’re ready, let the energy begin to recede and return to its original size. Maintain its presence in your body as you open your eyes and begin the following writing exercise.

Writing ExerciseFiction Writers
Think of a character you’ve created, maybe one you’ve been working with recently. Now, put that character on a train, heading to see his/her family for the holidays. Think about the character’s relationship with this space: Is this a regular occurrence – to be on a train heading to his/her childhood home? Or is this the first time? Whoh will the character see once she reaches her destination? How long will he be there? Who will this character see, and what feelings does she/he have around each person? Your character can be sitting quietly or moving around in the space. She/he can be contemplating the impending meeting or thinking about something else entirely. Show your character’s experience in the space, what happens in the waiting, and how this reflects in his/her thoughts and behaviors. It’s up to you whether or not you write to the actual arrival and meeting of family members.

Creative Non-fiction Writers / MemoiristsPick a tribe. This can be your family of origin, or it can be another community that has a strong presence in your life. Consider the following questions:
What’s your reality within this tribe right now?
Are you in harmony or conflict with this tribal reality?
What, or who, within this tribe, created your reality?
Do you have any unfinished business in relation to this tribe? (If so, what prevents you from healing it, either within yourself or with the person or people involved?)

When we’re able to achieve flow, as coined by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, our obstacles (read: writer’s block) disintegrate, and the words come effortlessly.

Csikszentmihalyi believes that when we’re in flow, when we experience complete absorption in a task, we realize happiness.

http://www.ted.com/talks/mihaly_csikszentmihalyi_on_flow

FLOW

=

concentration /complete absorption

=

happiness

In an interview with Wired magazine, Csikszentmihalyi described flow like this:

Flow is ”…being completely involved in an activity for its own sake. The ego falls away. Time flies. Every action, movement, and thought follows inevitably from the previous one, like playing jazz. Your whole being is involved, and you’re using your skills to the utmost.”(emphasis mine)

“Your whole being is involved.” Including your body. And when the “ego falls away,” you have greater access to your subconscious mind. And when we access our subconscious mind, it cleans our psychic house.

I know from experience that when I carve out a block of time and write, my perspective about everything changes. Writing is exercise for my psyche and my soul, just the way hiking, running, or biking are exercise for my body. When I exercise my body, I can face the day, no matter what comes. When I write, I can face life, no matter what comes.

If Csikszentmihalyi is correct in his assertion, and I believe he is–that when we’re absorbed in a task and achieve flow, we achieve happiness (and access to our subconscious mind)–why, then, do so many people struggle with achieving flow, and in the case of writers, with overcoming writer’s block?

Some people believe they have to wait for inspiration, but waiting for inspiration is for wusses, in my opinion. If we’re going to be real writers—that is, honor and respond to the multitude of voices and ideas that knock around in our heads, we have to treat it the way we would treat someone we love. We have to give it attention and effort. We have to maintain our relationship with it and to it. And we have to be aware that when we do this, our lives are better.

http://opioids.com/endogenous/candace-pert.html

Pharmacologist, Candace Pert, was doing some fascinating research on our emotions and where they originate when she died way too soon in 2013. In short, she discovered that our emotions are created in the very same locations as the seven main chakras of the body.

“I realized in 1987 that areas along the axis, from the top of the forehead to the base of the spine, these classical chakras areas corresponded to what I called ‘nodal points.’ Places where lots of neurotransmitters and neuropeptides were released.”

She went on to posit that because these neurotransmitters and neuropeptides are created in the body and that they create our emotions, “Our bodies are our subconscious mind.”

Learning this was my epiphany. My Eureka! moment. Not only was it fascinating to me, it was also liberating. This means that, as writers, we have no excuse to play the writer’s block card anymore. This means that we can have ready access to our emotions, which we writers need, to render full and round characters and tell stories with depth that resonate with our readers.

So in my mind, it looks like this:

This is where the chakras come into play.

When we learn how to unblock them, we achieve greater flow. When we learn to decode them and their positive and negative manifestations, we can begin to apply their aspects and lessons to our characters (if we’re writing fiction) and to our own lives (if we’re writing creative non-fiction/memoir).

By focusing on each chakra as a pulsating orb of energy, with specific qualities, we can begin to unblock them, and in turn, remove writer’s block.

The catch is this, though: We have to access our emotions.We have to.

And I believe this is where writers get blocked. I believe far too many writers with profound stories to tell stay quiet because they’re afraid to feel their emotions in great depth.

But it’s the only way. The only way.

So… if you’re a brave soul and you have stories to tell (and I know you do), stay plugged in to the blog for the next seven days, as I’ll be sending you an email each day featuring information about the chakra for the day and how you can use it banish your writer’s block, find your voice, and tell your untold stories.